Keith Urban Was Nervous For Opry Tribute
Keith Urban was one of the many superstars who performed on the Opry 100 TV special on NBC last week (3/19). Keith performed a tribute to fellow Opry member Crystal Gayle.
After the performance, we talked with Urban, and he told us, he was a bit nervous about his performance. He said, “It’s surreal and very intimidating playing ‘Don’t It Make Your Brown Eyes Blue’ in front of Crystal Gayle on the front row (laughs). I was trying not to look at her, but it was impossible.”
Keith added of the Grand Ole Opry, where he became a member himself in 2012, “The Opry is surreal anyway because there are so many… all these artists I grew up playing their music, and then they are there. I remember the first time I met Ricky Skaggs it was like meeting Santa Claus, I couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t a guy who looked like Ricky Skaggs, it was really Ricky Skaggs; he was just hanging side-stage.”
He concluded, “It’s a huge honor to be invited into that family.”
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Urban was in Dallas and Oklahoma City recently for the second and third stops as part of Taylor Sheridan and Blake Shelton’s new show, The Road. Premiering this Fall on CBS and Paramount+, The Road has been described as a headliner’s journey to discover the next big artist.
The contestants will compete to join Keith at subsequent tapings to secure a spot in the next town. Other stops for the show include Tulsa, Little Rock, Memphis, and Nashville.
Urban only had a few goals when he first started his music career many years ago. They weren’t particularly specific, except to move to Nashville and get his original songs on the radio.
He told us of his early goals in a recent interview, “They were very vague. I didn’t have a lot of specificity. All I wanted to do was live in America — in Nashville — make records, see if I could get some of those songs on the radio, see if I could get some songs that people know, and then those people maybe want to come and see those songs live and then I could tour with my own music as a live performer.” I could tour with my own music as a live performer.”
